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Friday, January 23, 2009

Teaser Friday

I’ve been working on two projects, both under contract. One of the projects will be my third book for Pulse, a novel in verse about a boy and a girl who are brought together because of the ghosts who haunt them, tentatively titled CHASING BROOKLYN. And the other is my first mid-grade novel titled IT’S RAINING CUPCAKES, about a girl who dreams of traveling but is stuck in Willow, Oregon helping her mother get a cupcake shop off the ground.

I had a teaser ready to go from the cupcake book and then I thought, maybe I shouldn't be doing this!? I mean, I don't really know what the rules are. The book is a long way from being out. I've posted a teaser from a book to give a little taste right before it's due to hit the shelves. But I don't know about a book I'm still doing revisions on.

So, since it's always better to be safe than sorry, here's a snippet from a book I finished and came close with agents a couple of times, but haven't done anything with since. I think about resurrecting it every once in awhile, and giving it a good overhaul. It's a mid-grade, and the title is SHINE BRIGHTLY about a girl and what happens when a traveling acrobat show comes to town that she's bound and determined to see despite the fact that her father can't afford to buy tickets for the show.

“You know, my daddy is still married to Caroline McDonald,” I said after Daddy introduced me to his new lady friend, Violet, my voice quivering as I said it. When I’m upset about something, I can’t seem to talk without that stupid quiver. But Daddy may not have told her about Mama, and she needed to know the truth.

“Brightly,” Daddy said, “you know that is not how we greet a person we’ve never met before. Now, do it the proper way.”

My daddy and his used car salesman ways. Because he greets every customer on the car lot with a hand shake, he expects me to greet people I meet the same way. But I didn’t want to smile and shake hands with this woman. So I just stood there.

Daddy looked at me and said through gritted teeth, “Brightly, I said, do it the proper way!”

I held out my hand, like he taught me. Violet looked at it for a second, like this wasn’t what she expected. Then she grabbed my pointer finger. Yep, just one finger. And she squeezed it. It was the sorriest hand shake I ever did see.

“Pleased to meet you, Brightly,” she said, with a wink. Or maybe it wasn’t a wink. One of her fake eyelashes was flapping around like a shingle in a wind storm. She must’ve seen me staring at it, ‘cause she reached up and tried to pat it into place. While she worked on her eyelash, I continued looking her over. She was tall and skinny. Her dress was so tight, I wondered how she could possibly breathe in the thing. She wore tiny barrettes with diamonds and pearls in her blonde, wavy hair. She was pretty. But not as pretty as Mama.